


Maybe, This Time (The Last Time)

by incogneat_oh



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Batman needs a Robin, Gen, Light Angst, offscreen character drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-11
Updated: 2017-03-11
Packaged: 2018-10-02 14:57:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10220771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incogneat_oh/pseuds/incogneat_oh
Summary: A look at what could have happened, after Tim quit. Set a few weeks after the events of Robin 124/125.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_protagonist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_protagonist/gifts).



–

Tim Drake is not asleep.

It is after 2am on a school night, so he probably  _should_  be. And he had dutifully tucked himself in at 10.30pm, as per his father’s instructions, ignored the smell of whiskey and disappointment thick on Jack’s breath. 

Things have been a little strained between them, lately.

To be fair, Tim thinks, staring at his shadowed-ceiling. Dana isn’t asleep. She is out for something called  _ladies night_ , the words inescapably glitter-encrusted and forbidding in Tim’s mind. He has some vague, half-formed ideas including alcohol and clubs and sequin and silk-rayon adorned women in their 20s and 30s, but beyond that, really has no idea. He doesn’t think he wants to know.

Tim is somehow tired but not sleepy, bone-weary but simultaneously restless. He shifts, irritated, on his cotton sheets and tries to close his eyes. The smell of fabric softener, a different brand to usual, prickles uncomfortably in his nostrils. 

He hates when the cleaner changes things.

He rolls over, kicking at the covers. He tries to close his eyes, pressing his face into the pillow. Breathing deep and willing himself into relaxation, if not sleep. But it hasn’t worked for the last 3 hours, so why should it now? Distracted, and uncomfortable, he sits up and scrubs a hand over his eyes. 

He knows he made the right decision. It was the best thing for everyone involved, right?

So why was it so painful, to give up Robin?

And Tim kicks his legs out from under the covers, pressing the soles of his feet flat to the wooden floor. He presses his palms, heavy, against his eyes for a few moments. He figures he can risk his dad’s wrath, for a glass of water from the bathroom. Just for something to occupy his hands, his thoughts, for a few seconds. Just for the opportunity to stretch his legs.

(He hadn’t seemed angry tonight, anyhow. Just sad and a little suspicious, which is the best Tim can hope for, especially when Dana isn’t around.)

He’s halfway into the hall and careful with it when he hears something downstairs. A barely-there sound, a  _swish_ , but one that Tim could recognise a hundred years from now. Batman.

He holds his breath, and moves as close to the landing as he dares. The yellow light from the living room paints the walls up here, broad, bold strokes that peter out towards the ceiling, cast long shadows over the top of protruding photo-frames. The light reaches so far as Tim’s toes, and the rest of him is in darkness.

Curiosity killed the cat. But no one said anything about the once-Robin.

There is the sound of silence. More specifically, Batman-silence. Which Tim knows too well.

And then, so sudden Tim almost-flinches, his father’s voice. Faintly slurred and spiteful, “Drop the farce,  _Bruce_. You can take off the stupid mask. We’re all friends, here.”

There’s a rumble of sound, Bruce’s voice too deep to hear, and Tim. Tim shouldn’t be cringing. Shouldn’t feel the hot flush of embarrassment colour his neck and ears. Shouldn’t be standing and eavesdropping on a conversation he can only hear half of. 

Tim should be asleep in bed.

“Right,” Jack’s voice, again. “Should be out recruiting some more kids, right? What was I thinking?”

And Batman– Bruce– just sounds tired, when he says, “Why did you call me here, Jack?”

“It’s about my son,” slurred, or just anger it’s hard to tell. “You’re not manipulating him anymore, are you?”

Tim can hear Bruce’s baritone, close to Batman’s growl. Cut low and near-contemptuous. But Tim, leaning tiredly against the wall, thinks it’s the sort of thing you’d only pick up on if you knew him well. 

Bruce, he knows, will be telling Jack that, no, he has not spoken to Tim since he quit. That he wasn’t manipulating him in the first place. That, so far as he knows, Tim has done nothing illegal or dangerous since their last encounter. Telling him the truth. That Tim is now, officially, a perfectly ordinary teenage boy. Albeit a little smarter than most.

Tim closes his eyes, rests his cheek against the cool plaster wall. 

His father is in A Mood. And if it were anyone but Batman– but  _Bruce_ , who can be very convincing even without the threat of violence– it wouldn’t do any good. But here, Tim’s a little hopeful. Tired, and disappointed. A little ashamed. But he’s hopeful, that Bruce can resolve this without making his dad angrier and more suspicious. Without giving his dad any more reason to doubt him.

Tim ignores the distant sounds of Jack’s renewed argument, something clattering to the floor. And he quietly goes back to his room.

–

Batman has been sitting under the stars for a good five minutes before he hears the scrape of Tim’s window. The faint creak of a wooden sill under pressure, the careful, muted  _thunk_  of the window sliding back into place. 

It’s another minute and a half before Tim appears over the edge of the roof. His hair is mussed from tossing and turning, but he looks fully awake from what Bruce can make out in the dim. 

His pyjama shirt is poking out untidily from beneath his woollen grey school-sweater, and his feet are bare, half-covered by the cuff of his flannel pants. They are striped in muted blues, and there’s a small hole frayed over his left knee.

Tim, wordless, confident (but not graceful), hauls himself completely onto the roof tile, clambers over to sit beside Bruce. He doesn’t say  _I thought you’d be here_ , same as Bruce doesn’t tell him,  _I waited, because I knew you’d meet me_. Because they are (were) partners. And these are the things they’ve never needed to say.

So Batman says, “Will he–?”

And Tim shakes his head, settling himself carefully, comfortably, beside the much larger man. Says, “What do you think took me so long?” And adds, “It won’t hold up to close scrutiny, though." 

They sit quietly for a moment, and Tim says, "Sorry about him.”

Bruce shakes his head. He asks, as carefully as he knows how, “How often does he–?”

“Not often enough for it to be a problem.” Tim seems prepared with the answer, softens it with a flash of teeth glinting in the moonlight. “Maybe three, four times a year. He never talks to me, though. When he’s. Y'know.” He adds, “And Dana’s out tonight, so I think he thought, that the coast was. Well. He probably didn’t plan on calling you.”

And the boy ducks his head in that familiar way of his, avoidance with a touch of humiliation. Usually a follow-up to nervous chatter or an embarrassing admission. His hair is getting long enough now that it sweeps over his face, partially obscuring the rising flush. But Bruce can see the way his bottom lip is brought between his teeth, dark pink and worn raw from the anxious habit.

Bruce will miss that.

And Bruce… has never been good at this, but figures this, too late, is as good a time as any, to give it a try. 

He never tried enough, with Tim.

And he breaches the distance between them, a heavy, gauntleted hand squeezing Tim’s bony shoulder. He’s skinny under the layer of flannel and dyed wool, not yet fully-grown. He can feel the rasp of cold air on every exhale, the weight of the boy’s ribs stuck under his palm. The expansion and slow exhale.

Tim says, “He wanted to make sure you’d never see me again, right?” and it’s expressionless, flat, a tell in itself. He’s looking out over his dark street, his profile partially lit by the low-hanging moon. And– it’s brighter out here, away from the city. Away from the concentrated pollution. Enough that Bruce– not Batman– can make out the smudges of sidewalks below, that Tim probably walks on everyday. Maybe with his Dad, or Dana. Or if he’s friends with any of the neighbouring kids, if he maybe uses his skateboard to cut between those trees. And Bruce  _wonders_.

“Yes,” he answers, because he’d left it there, waiting. Unspoken, but Tim had known it anyway, and his voice is rusted over and creaky with the admission.

Tim had known, but he still gives a tiny half-breath, and there’s a stiffness in his spine for a full second before he sags back down. His fingertips poke out from under his sleeves to trace the roof tile, even though he shivers at the touch. And all he can say is “Oh.”

There’s a gust of cold wind and Batman shifts, gathering up some of the cape. He nudges Tim, and the boy follows the non-verbal order on instinct, wriggling closer. He doesn’t lift his gaze from the roof, even when Bruce drapes the heavy cape and an arm over his shoulders. He uncurls, very slightly. Which Bruce takes as a victory.

And they sit, looking down on Tim’s quiet street from above. A bat and his bird. 

The boy says, “Will you tell Dick–?”

“I’m sure he already knows,” Bruce says. And Tim sneaks a look at him, out the corner of his eye, from under his soft, freshly-washed hair, from under his slightly-pinched eyebrows. 

“Will you tell him anyway?” Tim asks. 

“Of course.” He squeezes the boy’s shoulder, like permission. And Tim, hesitant, leans sideways until he can rest his head on Bruce’s shoulder. He’s stiff, for a moment, waiting for a rebuke or a shrug or a brush-off, but then he relaxes into it with a sigh. He shifts his creaking knees and wraps his arms around himself.

Bruce can feel Tim’s hair tickling the underside of his chin.

He allows himself the luxury of pulling Tim closer, feels, for the last time, the boy’s warm weight against his side. He’s smaller, without the padding. He says, quietly, “Thank you. For everything.”

Because some things need saying.

He almost regrets it when Tim pulls away, staring up at him with wide, tearful eyes. That Bruce realises, with some surprise, he had been trying to hide. He says, desperate, tongue tripping over itself, “No– no, that's–  _I_ should be thanking  _you–”_

Bruce pulls him in again, back into the warmth and safety of the cape. Fits him carefully against the kevlar and padding. He murmurs, “Come on, Tim. We both know that’s not true." 

And Tim shakes his head, face hidden, but he doesn’t try to speak again. His shoulders are trembling minutely, something Bruce doubts is to do with the cold. He is proved correct at the distinctly graceless sniffle, the little hitches and gasps of unsteady breath he can feel under his palm. 

Bruce has never been good with crying people.

Tim tugs back, after a few moments, far enough to scrub at his eyes with his sleeve. And he says, clearly and distinctly, but still somehow hesitant, voice full of tears– "I love you, B." 

Not Bruce, not Batman. Something more ambiguous, more blameless. Something with less responsibility.

But he’s already moving, eyes fixed back on the roof, when Bruce, voice as heavy as his heart, says, "I love you, Tim.” And he’s surprised, to find he means it. Words he never thought he’d say to this boy, to someone else’s son– Tim, too, from the look on his face.

–and it’s that, that has him crying again, renewed tears and quiet little hiccups. A desperate, lonely sound, face pinched and pale and small. He allows himself to fall back to Batman’s chest, one hand fisted in the fabric of the cape. He’s not Robin. He is a teenaged boy, who cries with the unfairness of the world on his shoulders. 

Bruce ducks his head, unsure. And the boy looks up, tearstained, and stutters, “You’re a better dad than him,” and the guilt, immediate, is written across his forehead. He goes on, dogged, explaining himself. Tells the roof-tile, “He never wanted me, you know? Not ‘til he thought someone else did.”

Batman carefully eases off one of his gauntlets, as Tim continues in the same hushed, watery tone. As though talking to himself. “It’s so unfair. M-my whole life, I would have done  _anything_ to get his attention. But as soon as I built a life without him, he decides to be a  _father_ –” he hiccups again. “Because it’s  _convenient_ –” and he startles, at the feeling of Bruce’s bare hand cautiously settling in his hair. 

Bruce smiles a little, apologetic at interrupting and awkward with affection at the best of times, but Tim just closes his eyes and rests more heavily against his chest. He pets absently at Tim’s hair (something Dick had always found comforting), wrapping the boy more securely in the cape against the cold. 

They sit in relative silence, after that. Only punctuated by Tim’s little shifts, his stuttering breaths. And the occasional sniffle and half-hiccup.

And the distinction is so slight, that Bruce doesn’t quite register it, at first. That Tim is drowsing, lightly  _asleep_ – pressed up into his warm spaces, the ones he didn’t know still existed, cuddled up like a much smaller child (like a smaller Robin, like Dick Jason  _someone else_ ), and it’s the ghost of a relationship that might have been. But it’s too late for that. 

The tears are dry on Tim’s face, gritty salt-slick lines still visible on his wind-pinked face. And Bruce owes Tim a lot, he knows. Apologies and gratitude and a whole lot of words he never said. 

Tim, he thinks. Was always much better to him, than he was in return. He never deserved Tim’s loyalty. 

And he thinks this, at least, is something he can do. Stay here for Tim, for a little while. In something almost like a farewell, pressed quiet into the dark, on rooftops and left largely unspoken. It is reminiscent of their whole relationship, Bruce supposes. And he tucks Tim up more carefully, more careful than he’s ever had cause to be, with the boy. Covers his skin and bare feet away from the icy air. And then he’s hidden away completely, a secret, though Bruce can feel the expansion of his every breath.

They stay that way for a long time. Batman looking out into the quiet street, Tim propped up against his side, under the cape. 

And it’s late enough that the whole thing has a feeling of unreality– a dreamlike quality, of surrealism and softness. He is, though, acutely aware of the feel of Tim’s sweater under his calloused palm, the collar where it peters out into flannel pyjamas. The gentlest puffs of warm breath, catching the stubble on the underside of his chin. The pressure against his ribshipthigh where Tim rests his weight. The loll of his head. The cold rooftop, digging into the padding at his glutes and the backs of his thighs. 

Bruce isn’t sure how long they’ve been there, how long since Tim’s soft breaths have turned into muffled snores. But Tim eventually shifts, to free his face from under the cape, to expose it to the night air. His hair is mussed, his face washed pale by the white moonlight, eyes still closed. And he settles back against Bruce’s side with a slight  _huff_. 

He wonders if Tim is awake.

It’s awhile before the silence is broken by a laugh. A small, snuffling thing, a breathy, half-asleep sound. Tim says, in answer to the question he doesn’t ask, “Sorry. Just thinking 'bout suburban Batman. Your costume’d probably change a fair bit.”

Bruce feels his lips quirk, automatic, at the non-sequitur. “Lot of newspaper thefts, are there?”

“An’ cats in trees,” Tim confirms. 

Bruce still can’t see his face, is looking down on the top of the boy’s head, at the dark hair spilling over his ears. And he can’t help but free his bare hand from under the cape, to brush it, lightly, over Tim’s short-scruff, freshly washed hair. Feels, rather than hears, his tired sigh.

And Batman closes his eyes. Tries to memorise this feeling, this night. This boy.

It’s a long time before either of them move again. And it’s reluctant, when it happens. Bruce rousing the boy. “Tim.” A gentle shake.

He stirs and sits up, rubbing at his red rimmed eyes. And Bruce– hadn’t realised he had fallen back to sleep. Not that it could have made a difference, when Batman shouldn’t be here, out in the suburbs. When Tim has to get up in a few hours for school. When Dana Winters might be home any minute. But he still needs a moment.

“Tim,” he says, again. 

And the boy cocks his head to the side, listening. Lips twisted in that way Bruce has learned means he’s trying not to chatter, or ruin a moment. 

Bruce is going to miss this boy. 

Tim tries to stay silent; he does. But at the stutter, the hitch in conversation where Bruce’s side should be, he says, “Shouldn’t you– probably–?”

Batman nods. But he doesn’t move, and Tim doesn’t pull back quite yet.

Bruce says, “He loves you a lot, Tim.”

“Yeah,” he says. Staring in the other direction. Then, “Boy, this sure is gonna take some getting used to.”

He hums his agreement. But before he can reply–

Tim looks up at him, a fierceness in his blue eyes that Bruce is all-too familiar with. He says, “You hafta be doubly careful, now. Because you don’t have me watching your back.” And he sticks out his jaw, his bottom lip protruding in something less threatening and more petulant. Demands, “ _Promise._ ”

“I promise,” Batman says. But the sad smile that comes through is all Bruce. He pulls Tim into a rough hug, hard enough he half-lifts him from the roof, and says. “Be safe. And be well.” Then, pulling back, “…Be  _happy_ , Tim.”

It isn’t until Tim breaks eye contact that Bruce starts to ease his hand back into its gauntlet. And for a second, in the very early morning light, Tim looks panicked– says, “Is this– we, probably won’t see each other again.”

“No,” Bruce agrees, solemn. (And it hurts, more than he expected.)

“Tell Alfred thanks for everything,” Tim says. He’s already starting to shiver, without the insulation of the cape.

“He’ll just brush it off,” Bruce says. “But I’ll tell him anyway.”

“Thanks.”

And they both sort-of move at the same time, stiff joints warming up (cracking, in Tim’s case, which probably means a growth-spurt) as they mostly stand. Then it’s quiet again, no more rustling of clothes or muted  _fwoosh_ es of oversized capes. The gap between them seems vast, though it can’t be more than a foot. 

No one says  _I’ll miss you_ , because it goes without saying. Instead–

“Goodbye, Batman.”

Bruce inclines his head to the house below, says, “You going to be alright, to get back in yourself?”

“Please explain to me how to break into my own house,” Tim says, voice dripping with friendly sarcasm. Eyes rolling. “ _Please_. It’s not like I’ve done it fifteen  _hundred_  times. I could really use your help on this one– no, really, tell me. I forget, do I climb down to my window, or the front door? Maybe my  _dad’s_  window, he’d love that–”

“Okay, Tim, forget I asked,” he says, lip twitching despite his best efforts.

And Tim’s laugh, the dorky one, follows him down from the rooftop. 

Even when the boy himself stays behind. 

**-END-**

**Author's Note:**

> Also found on [tumblr.](http://incogneat-oh.tumblr.com/post/41141195554/maybe-this-time-the-last-time)


End file.
